UMEB: Research Integrating Molecular and Environmental Sciences (R.I.M.E.S.) Program

分子与环境科学整合研究 (R.I.M.E.S.) 计划是一项国际研究和教育合作项目。 它是为已完成两年大学学业并致力于海洋或环境科学研究事业的积极进取的少数族裔学者创建的。 正如杰克逊博士在马萨诸塞湾社区学院为非传统学生开设的非常成功的生物技术项目一样，R.I.M.E.S. 的指导理念是：计划是持续的跨学科研究培训加上强化指导，推动非传统学者在科学领域取得成功。 其目标是在海洋和环境科学领域培养一支杰出且数量众多的少数族裔研究人员队伍，他们将为各自的领域带来卓越和急需的多样性。该项目在波士顿大学医学院 (BUSM) 开展，旨在帮助学者们做好博士学位项目学术严谨性的准备。 这是通过旨在提高学者在大三和大四期间的学术表现的密集指导和严格的辅导来实现的。 学者被选入 R.I.M.E.S.通过严格的申请流程进行计划，旨在仅识别和招募最有积极性的个人。 招聘的重点是那些个人情况使传统大学教育变得困难或不可能的男性和女性。 因此，招募主要来自三类大学二年级学生：(1) 来自单亲家庭的年轻非裔美国人和西班牙裔男性（美国最危险的两个社会群体），(2) 孩子年满 12 岁的单亲母亲，以及 (3) 推迟教育以抚养孩子的已婚妇女。 这些类别的学者面临着巨大的障碍进入大学。 因此，他们已经具备了推动成功科学家职业生涯的人类品质：坚持、专注、足智多谋、狡猾和坚韧。 R.I.M.E.S. 的学术部分该计划促进对这些属性的利用，以便学者们实现并期望持续取得卓越的学术成就。R.I.M.E.S. 的研究部分该计划通过在 BUSM 对蒙特塞拉特火山岛（北安的列斯群岛）夏季实地研究中收集的生物体进行分子研究，将海洋和环境科学与分子生物学结合起来。 由来自多个国家的知名海洋和环境科学家组成的研究导师团队可以在学者们返回 BUSM 的杰克逊博士实验室后为蒙特塞拉特岛的学者提供指导（通过电子邮件、电话和传真）。 这些研究项目集中于苏弗里耶尔山火山喷发（1995 年和 1997 年）和持续活动对蒙特塞拉特生态系统造成的环境压力的影响。 这场灾难造成的环境突变为在分子水平上研究生态系统发展提供了难得的机会。 研究重点是生物体对火山引起的突然环境变化做出适应性反应的分子过程。

The Research Integrating Molecular and Environmental Sciences (R.I.M.E.S.) Program is an international research and educational collaboration. It was created for highly motivated minority scholars who have completed two years of college and who are committed to research careers in marine or environmental sciences. As with Dr. Jackson's highly successful Biotechnology Program for nontraditional students at Massachusetts Bay Community College, the guiding philosophy of the R.I.M.E.S. Program is that continuous interdisciplinary research training coupled with intensive mentoring drive the success of nontraditional scholars in science. The goal is to produce an outstanding and numerically significant corps of minority researchers in the marine and environmental sciences who will bring distinction and much-needed diversity to their fields.The academic component of the R.I.M.E.S. Program occurs at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) and prepares scholars for the scholastic rigor of a doctoral-degree program. This is achieved through intensive mentoring and rigorous tutorials designed to enhance the academic performance of scholars during their junior and senior years. Scholars are selected to the R.I.M.E.S. Program through a rigorous application process designed to identify and recruit only the most motivated individuals. Recruitment focuses on men and women whose personal circumstances made traditional college education difficult or impossible. Thus, recruitment is primarily from three categories of college sophomores: (1) young African-American and Hispanic males from single-parent families (the two most at-risk societal groups in the nation), (2) single mothers whose children are 12 years and older, and (3) married women who deferred their education to raise children. Scholars from these categories attend college in the face of overwhelming obstacles. Thus, they already possess the human qualities that drive the career of a successful scientist: persistence, focus, resourcefulness, guile and tenacity. The academic component of the R.I.M.E.S. Program promotes the utilization of these attributes so that scholars achieve and expect continuous scholastic excellence.The research component of the R.I.M.E.S. Program integrates marine and environmental science and molecular biology through molecular investigations at BUSM of organisms collected in summer field research on the volcanic island of Montserrat (Northern Antilles). A corps of research mentors, established marine and environmental scientists from several countries, is available to guide the scholars on Montserrat and (by e-mail, phone and fax) after they return to Dr. Jackson's lab at BUSM. The research projects converge on effects of the environmental stresses exerted on the ecosystem of Montserrat by the eruptions (in 1995 and 1997) and ongoing activity of the Soufriere Hills volcano. The abrupt environmental changes produced by this cataclysm provide a rare opportunity to study ecosystem development at the molecular level. The investigative focus is on molecular processes that have been modified in adaptive response of organisms to sudden environmental changes caused by the volcano.